Fair Weather Friends
by Magnus McKay
Summary: The Doctor and Rose find themselves on Mars in the 45th Centuary, landing in the middle of what should be a bustling bizzare. But there's something wrong with the people here, something wrong with the taste of the place and more importantly, with its weather. The Doctor and Rose have a climate to fix, but will it come in time?


He was tall, handsome looking with wicked hair and a wild, almost manic grin. From the tip of his slightly punky looking hair cut to the red converse on his feet, this guy just screamed odd. Not in a bad way, just… an peculiar way that you couldn't put a finger on.

She was blonde, glittery eyed and she was smiling almost as widely as he was. For all of his oddity, she was unusually normal. But she had that travel wise look about her, someone who had a fair few stories to tell and all the time in the world to tell it.

They were stood in the middle of a bizarre, all manner of weird wonderful people passing them by. The woman's eyes are eager as she looks round at all the wonderful items on sale.

"So, where are we then, Doctor?" the woman asks.

"Why don't you deduce? We haven't deduced for a while, so lets deduce, Rose." the one called the Doctor said with a grin.

Rose gives him a funny look, one eyebrow raised. The Doctor looks back at her expectantly.

"Or we could infer, or assume… or maybe deem? No, deem is to serious." he says with a frown.

Rose just begins to laugh and pretty quickly the Doctor join's in and grabs her hand, swinging her in a circle.

"Take a look around, come on get thinking. Where do you think we are?" he asks again, stopping her with a hand.

"Okay, okay. There's no obvious looking aliens, but looking at the technology we're not in the past," Rose smiles, she looks up at the sky, "Sky's orange so either a pigment or dust… so we're not on Earth."

"Yep, yep and yep. Come on, you're getting closer."

"Okay, um… I haven't a clue."

"Awww… how long have you been travelling with me? Right, by the signs that you have expertly deduced, we are not on Earth, we're not in the past. We are in fact in the 45th Century, slap bang in the middle of the Martian bizarre. You can buy practically anything here."

Rose's eyes light up and she looks around at the stalls and rushes forward to the closest, dragging the Doctor by the hand after her. She pours over the strange foods before her, picking things up and sniffing them in intrigue. The Doctor digs into his coat pocket and pulls out a few coins, handing them to her then wanders off.

The Doctor frowns and looks around closely. He digs his glasses out of his inside pocket and looks up at the sky, then takes a closer look at the people in the bizarre. He frowns and focuses on the sky again. Rose taps him on the shoulder and jumps, twisting round to face her. Rose looks taken aback.

"Where were you then?" she asks handing him a throwaway cup.

The Doctor just smiles at her and shrugs. Rose chuckles at him, her eyes warm with her smile. The Doctor slides his glasses off, takes the cup and gives its contents a cautious sniff.

"It's called Vermillion Cherry. It's made from the Mars Vermillion Cherry's and mixed with it's nectar." Rose says with a smile.

She takes a sip and looks approvingly into the cup. Doctor follows suit and pulls a face, not quite sure about it.

"What's up, your Spider-senses tingling?" Rose asks him.

"I'm not quite sure. It just tastes off." the Doctor replies.

"I think it tastes amazing. Do you recon I should take some home for mum?"

"Nah, I thought she was more keen on something with alcohol content?"

"What are you saying about my mother?"

"Nothing…" the Doctor says, shaking his head rapidly.

The Doctor looks round again, frowning and putting his glasses back on. Rose puts her cups down on the nearest stall and looks round herself.

"Don't you think's something's off?" the Doctor says with a frown.

"What do you mean off?" Rose asks, frowning herself now.

"It seems bizarre." the Doctor sighs.

Rose gives him a funny look and he rolls his eyes at her.

"Uhh, I know we're in a bizarre. I mean strange," he adds frowning again, "Look closely. What do you see?"

Rose looks round and her frown deepens as she picks up on the little points that meant something was definitely off. She'd been to many bizarre's across a dozen different galaxies and there was one constant, they were cheap. Even she knew the prices here were too high and there were too many closed stalls. Now she looked closer the people were thin and grey looking, not well at all.

She looks back at the Doctor, the smile sliding from her face. He looks back at her grimly.

"Doctor, these people. I don't think they're well." she says with worry.

"Oh its much more than that. These people are starving." the Doctor replies, sorrow burning in his eyes.


End file.
